Martin Angelina, Mob Underboss, Sentenced to Probation for Aggravated Assault

Nearly a year after spitting in the face of a Margate police officer, mob underboss Martin Angelina was sentenced Friday to a year's probation and fined $1,000 for aggravated assault.

Angelina, 48, said little during the sentencing hearing before Atlantic County Superior Court Judge Bernard DeLury. Neither he nor his lawyer, M.W. "Mike" Pinsky, would comment as they left the third-floor courtroom.

Dressed in a blue striped polo shirt and jeans, the once roly-poly wiseguy appeared tan and fit as he stood before DeLury at his brief court appearance.

Asked by the judge if he had anything to say, Angelina replied, "Nothing."

DeLury described Angelina's confrontation with Police Officer Christopher Taroncher as "boisterous and profane," but said he would accept a plea deal between Pinsky and the Atlantic County Prosecutor's Office.

The South Philadelphia resident formally entered his guilty plea in June.

The fact that Taroncher was not injured apparently played a role in the prosecution's decision to downgrade the charge to a fourth-degree offense that did not require a jail sentence.

Angelina, DeLury pointed out, has 12 prior arrests and six convictions. He also has a driving-while-intoxicated charge pending in Philadelphia Common Pleas Court. His most serious offense was a conviction for racketeering in 2001. Angelina served nearly six years and was twice jailed for probation violations after his release because he associated with organized-crime figures.

The current probation sentence includes a similar prohibition for the mobster. He also will be required to attend weekly counseling sessions at Alcoholics Anonymous or a similar organization.

Pinsky told DeLury that the current charge was not connected with organized criminal activity. He said it grew out of a domestic dispute.

Angelina was arrested early on Sept. 1, 2009, at an apartment in Margate where he was staying with a girlfriend, according to police. Neighbors had complained about shouting. He and the girlfriend had been arguing while drinking at some local bars and the dispute continued at home, police said.

Angelina spent several hours in the Margate lockup and was being released around 8 a.m. when, officials said, he got into an argument with Taroncher, who was in the process of freeing him. He then spit in Taroncher's face. Angelina was rearrested on an assault charge and remained in the lockup for two more hours before $2,500 bail was posted.

Once described by a federal prosecutor as a "bully running with a gang of misfits," Angelina was a close associate and enforcer for jailed mob boss Joseph "Skinny Joey" Merlino, who ruled the Philadelphia mob family in the late 1990s. Merlino, Angelina, and five codefendants were convicted in the 2001 racketeering case in Philadelphia.

Angelina, according to federal and local police, was named underboss, the number-two man, in the local mob by reputed boss Joseph "Uncle Joe" Ligambi after Angelina completed his prison sentence. The move was seen in law enforcement and underworld circles as a favor to Merlino. Angelina is not considered a close associate of Ligambi's.

Ligambi, 70, has taken a low-key approach to running the crime family and frowns on actions - like spitting on a police officer - that attract media attention.

Angelina, Ligambi, and nearly a dozen other mob figures are the focus of a racketeering investigation being conducted by the FBI and U.S. Attorney's Office in Philadelphia, according to witnesses and investigators involved in that probe.

Thanks to George Anastasia

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Trial Ordered Over Beating of a Mob Rival

Louis "Bent Finger Lou" Monacello was ordered to stand trial on assault charges today after a government witness testified that back in July he agreed to pay $2,000 to have mob rival Marty Angelina beaten.

Frank "Frankie the Fixer" DiGiacomo said Monacello paid him the money in two installments and that part of one payment included $700 that DiGiacomo owed Monacello.

Testifying at a preliminary hearing this morning, DiGiacomo, 45, said Monacello originally talked about killing Angelina, but later said he just wanted him "beat up really bad."

Dressed in a tee shirt and work pants and sporting a goatee, DiGiacomo spent about 45 minutes on the stand. The former South Philadelphia plumber began cooperating with the State Police late in 2007.

Deputy Chief State Attorney General Erik Olsen offered testimony from DiGiacomo and from State Trooper Glenn Hopey to support the charges in the case. Olsen also played parts of three conversations secretly recorded by DiGiacomo.

Over the objections of defense attorneys who argued the government had failed to support the charges, Municipal Judge Bradley Moss ruled that the case could move forward to trial.

Monacello, 41, is charged with soliciting an aggravated assault and attempted aggravated assault.

While not part of today's testimony, investigators have said that Monacello had a falling out with Angelina over the collection of gambling debts.

Monacello and 16 others were arrested in July on gambling and loansharking charges related to an organized crime investigation in Delaware County dubbed operation "Delco Nostra."

The alleged plot against Angelina was uncovered during that investigation.

Thanks to George Anastasia

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First Conviction from "Operation Delco Nostra" Organized Crime Investigation

State prosecutors have scored their first conviction stemming from the "Operation Delco Nostra" organized-crime investigation that led to 17 arrests last summer and exposed an alleged plot to attack Philadelphia mobster Martin "Marty" Angelina.

Daniel Diedrich, a former supervisor in the Delaware County Domestic Relations Department, pleaded guilty yesterday in Media to one count of bookmaking. He was sentenced to two years' probation and fined $1,000.

Diedrich, 34, of Clifton Heights, was a low-level member of the sophisticated bookmaking, gambling and loan-sharking organization that authorities say was run by Nicholas "Nicky the Hat" Cimino between 2002 and 2007.

"He was not in a management position. He was a worker," said Chief Deputy Attorney General Erik Olsen.

Olsen said there was no evidence that Diedrich had engaged in any illegal activity while working in the county courthouse.

The other defendants, including reputed Philly mob associate Louis "Bent Finger Lou" Monacello, are scheduled for a hearing in Delaware County court in March on charges that include gambling, bookmaking, criminal conspiracy and corrupt organizations.

Monacello, 42, of South Philadelphia, who authorities say answers to jailed former consigliere George Borgesi, is also charged in Philadelphia with soliciting aggravated assault. According to a grand-jury presentment, Monacello tried to hire someone to have Angelina - allegedly a "made" member of the mob - beaten so badly he'd be hospitalized.

Monacello's preliminary hearing on that charge is set for next week.

Borgesi, imprisoned in West Virginia, was convicted in 2001 during a 14-week racketeering trial along with former Philadelphia crime boss Joseph "Skinny Joey" Merlino.

Thanks to William Bender

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Mob Strike Force Will Remain Intact to Confront Gangsters Returning from Prison

Recently there's been more intrigue about the fate of the U.S. Organized Crime Strike Force than about mob plots in Philadelphia.

Well, the strike force has dodged a bullet, sort of.

Officials of the U.S. Attorney's Office said Friday that strike-force prosecutors would be devoted to organized crime - La Cosa Nostra and emerging ethnic groups from Russia, Asia, the Middle East and elsewhere. They will not be interchangeable with drug prosecutors, officials said.

The deal was worked out between the U.S. Attorney's Office and the Justice Department in recent days. And it comes not a moment too soon, as dozens of mobsters are returning home from prison.

Last Wednesday, Assistant U.S. Attorney David Fritchey underwent a proper moblike introduction to the cappi di tutti in Washington, D.C.

"This is Dave from Philly. He's a friend of ours," joked Fritchey, about his own introduction as the newly appointed chief of the strike force here.

The Boss of all Bosses, Matthew W. Friedrich, the acting assistant attorney general of the Criminal Division at the Justice Department, blessed Fritchey as chief and preserved the nine-prosecutor unit as part of his special-strike-force duties.

Fritchey, a longtime mob prosecutor, takes over the prestigious strike force, which put scores of mobsters behind bars during the reigns of several mob bosses, from Nicodemo "Little Nicky" Scarfo in the '80s to Joseph "Skinny Joey" Merlino in '01. "I expect to do long-term projects and quick-hitting ones in real time," said Fritchey.

Robert Reed, deputy chief of the Criminal Division in the U.S. Attorney's Office, said that he hopes for "cross-pollination" between the drug unit and strike force, now located next to each other after a move over the weekend.

"I think highly of Fritchey as a prosecutor. He's a very independent guy," said Louis Pichini, retired strike-force attorney and former chief of the Criminal Division. "But how much independence will he have?"

If strike-force attorneys had to try a tsunami of drug prosecutions as earlier suggested, retired prosecutors and investigators said, they would not have time to attack the most complicated organized-crime cases.

Nor could they monitor nearly 30 mobsters released from prison since the early 1980s, or others who pose threats to society, they said.

Recently, an intelligence analyst who studied organized-crime activities to find links among them was transferred to the terrorism unit.

"I strongly disagree with the dilution of the program," said Joel M. Friedman, strike-force chief for 22 years, now working with retired FBI director Louis J. Freeh's consulting firm, Freeh Group International.

"This is one of the most violent LCN [La Cosa Nostra] families in America," Friedman said. "They swear an oath to protect the family. They are getting out [of prison] and will reconstitute the family."

James T. Maher, retired FBI supervisor of the organized-crime unit, is so concerned that he still keeps track of mobsters coming home.

Last March, Vincent "Big Vince" Filipelli, 54, a bodyguard and enforcer for mob boss John Stanfa in the 1990s, was sent back to prison to serve a 66-month sentence for extortion. The "made" member earlier served a 54-month sentence for racketeering extortion in the Stanfa era.

In 2001, mobster Martin Angelina, 45, was convicted of racketeering with Merlino and served a 54-month prison sentence. Last year, Angelina was caught associating with mobsters and returned to prison for four months. And he may be in trouble again - he has a hearing tomorrow on a related matter.

Tomorrow, Thomas R. Perricone will be named deputy chief of the Criminal Division in charge of drugs and organized crime, and Faith Taylor will be named chief of the narcotics unit.

Thanks to Kitty Caparella

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